


Letting Go; Holding On

by twistedmiracle



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: 8th year, F/M, Immaturity, M/M, Sneaky Draco, So many blowjobs, gets what he wants, stupid Ginny, wrecks her own love life
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-12
Updated: 2021-03-12
Packaged: 2021-03-19 04:21:19
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 11,091
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29993793
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/twistedmiracle/pseuds/twistedmiracle
Summary: Pulled off my old dead Skyehawke account, thanks to the Wayback Machine.After so many years of feeling helpless in the face of far too much responsibility, it was a relief to let go.Originally 1 chapter, now (june 2009) with a 2nd that truly ends the storyline. h/d harry/draco draco/harry drarry hogwarts post-war[ book > Harry Potter ] [ Rated X [V,S]	] [ Published 2008-09-06 ] [ Last Updated 2009-07-19 ] [ No Genre ] [ Characters Harry Potter, Draco Malfoy ]
Relationships: Draco Malfoy/Harry Potter, Harry Potter/Ginny Weasley, Hermione Granger/Ron Weasley, past Dean Thomas/Ginny Weasley - Relationship
Kudos: 20





	1. Letting Go

Title: Letting Go  
Author:  
Rating: NC-17  
Word Count: ~4750  
Your challenge is for: harrysexmagick  
Keywords: popcorn, hide, Freddy/Michael/Jason (you pick)  
Dialogue: "What are these round silver thingies?"  
Summary: Ginny wanted to get back together. Harry was happy to. Ginny wanted him at Hogwarts, he went. Ginny wanted him to socialize more, he did. After so many years of feeling helpless in the face of far too much responsibility, it was a relief to let go.  
Beta Acknowledgement: melusinahp and DrGaellon.  
Author's Note: I don't usually abide Ginny bashing, but I got this plot bunny…. Oh yeah. I think you can expect a sequel.  
Disclaimer: They aren't mine, they belong to the clever Scottish lady. I just bend them and love them. Please don't smack me for playing. It isn't like I am going to earn any money from this!

Harry leaned back against the couch, feet stretched out under the coffee table, Ginny resting between his legs and in his arms. Ron and Hermione were cuddling above, splayed out similarly, but they'd rushed for the couch, leaving the floor to Harry and Ginny.

Harry didn't mind. It was more important to stick close to Ron and Hermione. He took another handful of popcorn and waited for Michael Corner to announce his chosen dare.

"Seamus, I dare you to transfigure those trousers into a proper kilt and do a handstand!"

Seamus - who'd been on the floor nearby, next to Dean - leapt to his feet, smiling, wand in hand. "Sloppy thinking, Ravenclaw! When you see my bait and tackle, you'll wish you hadn't made that dare. No bird here will ever want any other bloke in Hogwarts!"

The room, already bubbling with shock and giggles, spilled over with laughter.

But Ginny, Harry's modest, innocent Ginny, buried her face in his shoulder rather than look at Seamus' nudity. Proud and grateful, Harry caressed her shoulder and kissed her pretty hair.

Dean rolled his eyes, but Harry ignored him. He just wanted her back.

Harry looked, though, and laughed along with the rest, bouncing Ginny's slender frame on his chest as he did. Seamus' package was nothing to write home about, he decided. Ginny wouldn't have been misled, even if she had been tarty enough to look.

Seamus looked up at the low, white ceiling before a grin spread across his familiar face. "Zabini," he decided. "Truth or dare."

Harry pressed back against the couch. It was solid. It did not shift. He felt Ron's thigh nudge his shoulder a touch. He looked over his shoulder once. Yes, Ron. Hermione. Right where he'd left them.

"Truth!"

Ginny pressed herself against Harry's entire torso, but she was only sitting up a bit straighter after filling her palms with popcorn. Harry rubbed up and down on her arm, the fabric of her shirt moving a bit with his hand.

"Have you ever sucked a cock?"

Ginny wasn't like those loose girls on the other side of the room. She covered herself. She didn't hide her assets, so much as she was enticingly modest. And she always looked cute, but never indecent.

"Why do you want to know, Mr. Finnigan?" Zabini asked, with an exaggerated wink. Seamus only laughed.

Harry drank butterbeer while the others shared Seamus' laughter. Even Ginny laughed, but she was just caught off guard, shocked. Harry was sure. And it was funny, after all.

"No, actually, I haven't," Zabini crowed. "So you've rather wasted your turn and now it's mine!"

Harry was comfortable, resting against the couch, holding his girl, but he was also tired. He was willing to go since Ginny liked them, but why did they have to do these gatherings right after Ginny's Quidditch practices? Spending a few hours staring up into the January cold exhausted him. He leaned over Ginny. "Want to head back to Gryffindor soon?"

She turned, her long, poppy-red hair falling like a curtain over his arm and chest. He loved the way that looked. "Sure." She looked relaxed and happy. "In about ten? Tell my brother you want to go. I'll bet he and Hermione will come too, after we all finish our butterbeers?"

He kissed her forehead, and the room erupted in raucous laughter and catcalls. Dean bashed him on the shoulder and a tender kiss became a crack of skulls.

"Ow! What the hell, Dean?"

Ginny said nothing but rubbed daintily at her forehead, where Harry's teeth and jaw had made the most contact.

"Malfoy's got to suck your cock, mate!"

Harry sputtered as all the blood drained from his head, and face, and brain. A hundred miles away, the others laughed and laughed. He could hear Ron sputtering, Hermione's more pedantic tone.

Trapped between Ginny and the couch, he could not stand, and the room was very cold.

Finally, Harry managed to form a sentence. He tested it in his mind, and felt good about it, so he leaned toward Ginny's ear and spoke it there, quietly. "Don't worry, I won't. I would never cheat on you like that."

Ginny looked at him, blank and open, then she blinked. "Er… come into the hall with me?"

* * *

Harry shuffled his feet. They'd been checked on once already, but he still couldn't believe what his girlfriend was saying, and he wasn't accepting this until he understood.

"It's degrading." She looked so earnest. Her hand was on his hip, squeezing a little. "It's humiliating. I would never do that. And I know," her smile warmed him despite the clenching feeling in his guts, "that you would never ask something like that of me. You respect me! But it isn't shameful to accept one, only to give it. And you deserve these kinds of rewards. Besides, he deserves to be punished."

"So…" he paused to look into her eyes. Warm and brown and sincere, she nonetheless held an intensity about her tonight that he didn't usually see away from the Quidditch pitch. "You think he can give me something I'll enjoy, even though it's disgusting? So he should give it, not you?"

"Not disgusting, never disgusting." She moved nearer to his side, and her hand got closer to his half-hard cock. She looked up at him again, and their eyes met and held. "When we get married, and I finally see all of you and… nothing about you could possibly be 'disgusting' Harry." She rested her head on his shoulder for a moment, then found his gaze again. "What we have, and what we will have once we marry, is something beautiful, spiritual, and based on pure love and equality. A… 'blowjob,'" she looked uncomfortable merely allowing the word to dirty her mouth, "is… I mean, just think about the positions! You'll be standing up, and he will be on his knees. There's nothing beautiful or equal or innocent or loving about any of it, Harry."

Uneven lumps of stone pressed against his back. "So you wouldn't ever want… from me…" There were words he wasn't comfortable saying either, as it turned out.

"No! Certainly not. That's repulsive." Her hand left his jeans as her arms went up across her chest, and Harry took one deep breath.

"So, we're agreed?" Her face looked like she was about to take off into the air for a Quidditch match. It was very hard to say no.

"I… you don't think this is cheating on you?"

"You won't be giving him anything that's mine except a glance at your… body." She blushed deeply. "Why don't we blindfold him, actually? Then he can't even have that."

He searched her face, and she searched his eyes in return. He didn't want her to regret this, but she clearly felt her only regret would be if he said "no." He still didn't understand, but was that important? He was so bad at this stuff: knowing who was right, who was good, how to keep a girlfriend, how to be kind. Ginny was his innocent, shining light. He'd come back to her and found her, just the way he'd dreamed she would be. He had to keep her. He could acquiesce.

They found an unlocked, abandoned classroom behind the next tapestry. It was all so convenient; it made him nervous. But perhaps… this meant it was okay?

She kissed him once, her hands on his chest, his hands on her waist. He watched her return to the party, open the door, and beckon silently. He found himself wishing she would just go back to Gryffindor with him and forget all about this. It would be simpler, and so much more private. And yet….

Harry followed as she led Malfoy - silent, looking toward the floor - into the room and transfigured her Alice band into a fat, black blindfold. Malfoy's wince was barely visible when she yanked it tight around the back of his head and tied it, but he said nothing.

Then she kissed Harry on the jaw and walked out. Her Colloportus sounded distant through the heavy old wood.

"Er…" Harry hadn't been this uncomfortable since Mrs. Weasley had caught him snogging Ginny in the garden.

"I know this is awkward, Potter, just… lead me near, will you?" Malfoy spoke quietly. He sounded… humble. Possibly even contrite. This was so damn bizarre.

Harry swallowed, then moved away from the wall and took Malfoy's hand from where it hung at his side.

"I, er… I'll just sit in a chair. Come with me?"

Malfoy nodded and they moved toward the closest chair. Malfoy was shuffling, like he feared Harry would walk him right into a desk.

Once Harry was seated he again felt unable to do or say anything useful, but Malfoy knelt down in front of him and took charge.

He moved Harry's hands gently, then blindly found and undid the fastenings on Harry's jeans. Harry forced himself not to squirm.

A horrible thought occurred to him. "Are they… listening?"

Malfoy rested his hands just to the right and left of Harry's opened clothing and confused penis. His hands were warm. "I don't know. Do you know how to check? Because I don't."

Harry considered this. He didn't either. But he could cast a fairly powerful Silencio. "No, but I can silence the entire room and then it won't matter."

Malfoy hesitated. Then he nodded and Harry drew his wand. He raised it to cast Silencio and paused. He had Draco Malfoy, blindfolded, kneeling at his feet, hands out and empty. He could do anything.

His wand wobbled and he glared, forced it to still. A thousand spells crowded into his brain, followed by images.  
Densaugeo; Malfoy clutching at enormous front teeth.  
Petrificus Totalus; stomping on Malfoy's nose.  
Stupefy; kicking him in the ribs.  
Incarcerous or Levicorpus; parade him through the halls like a trophy.  
Diffindo; strip the slashed clothing from him and leave him naked and wandless.  
Legilimens; see what the hell was in Malfoy's head and why he would do this without protest.  
Imperio; … and what, exactly? He was apparently about to get a blowjob without having to violate the law or upset Ginny. He watched his cock get a little closer to hard.

Malfoy shifted on his knees but said nothing.

He didn't really want to hurt Malfoy any more. He'd moved so far beyond wanting to hurt anyone. He didn't even want to pay attention to other people, really. He wanted to huddle with Ginny, with Ron and Hermione. He wanted Ron and Hermione to smooth out and relax into something comfortable and safe. He'd had his chance to be in charge, and he shuddered when he thought about the deaths, the Unforgivables, how close he'd come to fucking everything up so completely.

It was too much.

He hadn't spared a serious thought for anyone outside of Gryffindor tower all year.

He hadn't even been aware that Malfoy was at the party until Dean had shoved and shocked him.

Malfoy raised a hand to his lips and politely pretended to cough. He must be wondering what the hell was going on in Harry's head.

"Silencio."

The space went shockingly silent. Harry recalled a show on American flights to the moon he'd managed to watch at Mrs. Figg's. He couldn't hear his heartbeat or breathing. He couldn't hear the sounds cloth should make as Malfoy found Harry's cock, pulled it from his opened pants. Harry couldn't hear his own gasp when Malfoy stroked him once, found the moisture at the tip and spread it in a tiny oval with his thumb.

Harry opened his legs a little more and Malfoy shuffled closer, but Harry didn't hear the sounds his knees should have made on the floor.

Then Malfoy leaned in further and pulled Harry's cock away from his belly. He put his lips around the now completely erect head, and Harry stopped thinking at all.

Wet. Muscular. Attentive and warm and hands… hand on his balls. Pulling gently at the skin there, not so gently, holy fuck what was Malfoy doing to his cock and his balls and his scrotum and why had no one ever done it to him before, and he was coming and coming and coming harder and longer and leaning forward, gripping the chair seat, trying to press further and further into that amazing feeling and… done.

He leaned backwards and panted, willing the oxygen into his tingling face, tingling hands. He was spent.

He looked down, and there was the instrument of his pleasure. Draco Malfoy, head hanging between Harry's knees, bowed down on the floor like a supplicant to a king. He wasn't touching Harry any longer, and Harry looked at the other boy's hair. Gratitude for Malfoy's blindfold slammed his chest.

Harry moved to sit up straighter and tuck himself back into his clothes. Malfoy sat back on the floor, making no move to remove the blindfold.

Harry finished redressing himself and stood, moving away from Malfoy, feeling more awkward and uncomfortable than he'd expected. What the hell came next?

He cast Finite Incantatem and then stood there like an idiot. Was "thank you" appropriate now that he could speak? "See you around?" Perhaps "that felt good" or "thanks for swallowing?"

His mouth opened, though he had no idea what he was planning to say. "I'll… just… go. I think I, Ginny and I, are going to go back to Gryffindor now. We were about to leave just before your dare anyway. I… do you want me to tell them you're done playing, too?"

"Please," Malfoy said softly, looking at the floor. Then he reached up and pulled off the blindfold. "Will your girlfriend want her Alice band back?" He still didn't look higher than Harry's knees.

"Oh!" Harry knew she would, but that would mean moving back toward Malfoy again. "Yes, of course. That's…" the word came to him. "Thoughtful of you." He took a step closer and leaned toward Malfoy's outstretched hand. He hadn't moved quite close enough and he stumbled slightly as he grabbed for the cloth. Their fingers scraped past one another and Harry's skin burned. He coughed once and rushed from the room.

** ** **

Twenty minutes later, Harry was alone inside the curtains of his narrow Hogwarts bed. He was surprised to find himself getting hard again, and reached inside his pyjamas to touch. With one hand around his balls, he tried what Malfoy had done and it still felt incredible. He grabbed the head of his cock. Which had been in someone's mouth - Malfoy's mouth - just a few staircases away, just a few minutes before.

Thanks to whispered murmurs from Ginny, he'd been imagining their wedding night for months. White lingerie, a huge bed, candles, her breasts in his hands, under his lips.

He'd imagined sinking his cock into something as soft as feathers, tight as newly outgrown Quidditch leathers, wet as honey. He'd imagined watching Ginny above him, her beautiful hair falling all around his face in candlelight as she rose and fell on him.

That mental picture was going to change, he realized.

He tried to go back to the old fantasy, but images based on ideas and hopes stood no chance against fresh, real, memory.

He came picturing Malfoy sucking his cock, imagining only that he'd touched Malfoy's hair while it had happened.

*** *** ***

The next morning Harry blushed to see Seamus at the sink, but Seamus had thoughts only for his own hangover. By the time he got to the common room it was clear that what had been an enormous moment for him had been meaningless to everyone else in the tower.

Even Ginny was calmly putting together the birthday present for her father that Harry and Hermione had helped her gather.

Ron sat with her as they waited for Seamus, Lavender, Neville and Dean. They generally all headed to breakfast together these days.

"What are these round silver thingies?" he asked, sticking a fingertip into the odd assortment of key rings, snaps, paper clips and shoelace grommets.

Harry watched silently as Hermione happily bored Ron, explaining everything with too much detail. Ginny was leaning against Harry, only half listening to Hermione, if Harry was right about what her hair twirling meant. She'd already heard it all, but found some of it too confusing to remember properly. Snaps, key rings and paper clips, in particular, were amusingly foreign.

Buying the items had been very funny, really. The exchange rate had not been in Ginny's favour, and she'd had little to start with in the first place. She refused to allow Harry to help her buy the gift, simply smiling silently at him, arms akimbo and forehead tipped at him, till he sheepishly withdrew the offer. Then she'd kissed his cheek and tried her best not to squeal and alert the other patrons that she'd never seen the vast majority of items in that, or any nearby, shop.

In the end Harry had picked up his own gift for Mr. Weasley. It was painful to think about how much that family had done for him, how much they meant to him, and how much suffering he'd caused them, all at the same time. He knew a cheap toaster couldn't really accomplish anything - not even toast, since the house wasn't wired for electricity. He hoped Mr. Weasley would appreciate it, though, and possibly even understand the sentiment.

Harry knew he'd never manage it with words, so the small white toaster would have to stand in.

They all went slowly down to breakfast together, Neville carrying Lavender's books and Seamus taking her arm today. They never had to wait for a staircase anymore, but they were nonetheless always the last group to arrive at the table.

Harry had spent a few months worth of breakfasts focused on Lavender's difficulty with benches, Ron and Hermione's bizarre dance, and his own need to sit with Ginny at every possible opportunity. He'd been relieved to forget Malfoy and all of the Slytherins.

But this morning after filling his plate with toast and jam, eggs and tomatoes, he looked up, wondering if Malfoy would be there.

What he saw stayed with him all day.

Malfoy was eating breakfast, alone at the first years' end of the table. His left side was toward the teachers, and the closest Slytherins were so much shorter than him Harry could see the height difference from two tables over. Malfoy sat like he'd fused an iron rod to his spine.

While he cut his scrambled eggs with a knife and fork he made eye contact with no one, spoke to no one. He looked like he belonged in Madame Tussaud's, not the Great Hall.

Harry thought this so odd that he looked up frequently to make sure he hadn't misunderstood, which is how he saw Pansy Parkinson deliberately spill a full goblet of pumpkin juice all over Malfoy's school bag as she walked the long way out of the Great Hall. She was followed by several other Slytherins. They didn't even wait until they were halfway to the door before they allowed their derisive laughter to become audible all the way over to Harry.

**** **** ****

Harry let this new information roil inside him for over a week before he spoke to anyone about it. But as the week passed, he saw more. Goyle tripped Malfoy in the hallway. There was another game of truth or dare, and Zabini dared Malfoy to eat moldy bread Zabini had procured somehow. That Greengrass girl called him a cocksucker as she passed his potions station. All the Slytherins and most of the other students laughed until Slughorn bustled in.

Malfoy handled it all so badly. He'd no experience brushing off the kinds of attacks most teenagers his age would have long since learned to deflect. He'd had Crabbe and Goyle to protect him for years, and he was a mess. Sometimes he blustered and they handily mocked his attempts. Sometimes he hung his head or rushed off.

Once, Harry thought he saw Malfoy allow the tears to show. Harry had to look away. Imagine! Draco Malfoy, crying in public! The world had certainly changed.

The more he saw, the worse Harry felt.

After a few days, the images of Malfoy being bullied started to block the blowjob memories he now needed for his nightly wank. He'd be about to come, pulling hard at his scrotum with one hand, twisting and stroking the head of his cock with the other, Malfoy's memorable lips wrapped around him, and just before he was about to come, newer images would come crowding in, interfering. Sometimes they even kept him from orgasm.

It sucked.

Was it just because his mind was at its most open then? Perhaps this was what Snape had been talking about when he ordered Harry to "clear your mind." Fat lot of good it did him every night when all he wanted was Malfoy on his knees and sucking, and what he got instead was images that made him feel pity.

He started to look for Malfoy wherever he went, wondering where he might see the other boy, and in what sort of shape. He never actually wanted to see Malfoy, yet, he did. He wanted to see the old Malfoy. The sneering one. The one who didn't need anything from Harry. Every time he saw the new one instead, he cringed.

Finally, he mentioned it to Ginny. They were taking a walk outside, bundled up in cloaks and Mrs. Weasley's knitting. The air was so crisp he breathed through his scarf, and he couldn't feel anything but pressure from clasping Ginny's gold and crimson mitten in his own.

"I've been noticing Malfoy since… you know." He watched the snowy path pass underfoot.

Ginny squeezed his hand and let him continue.

"I think the other Slytherins have been, er, bullying him."

"Good," Ginny responded.

Harry kicked a clump of snow into the lake. It sank slowly, melting away without a sound or a trace. "Good?"

"He was horrible last year. To everyone. Constantly. Worse than ever, and that's saying something. He could use a little come-uppance."

"He wasn't actually horrible to everyone all the time. I mean, he tried to protect me once. And Hermione and Ron too, in the end."

"When he didn't recognize you?"

"I think, I actually…" Harry scratched his forehead with damp red wool. The scar was still there. The scar that had still been visible, even when his whole face was distorted by Hermione's clever hex. "I think he did recognize me. I think he just, er, I think he lied."

"He's a liar, so it can't have been that hard for him. Harry," she stopped walking and faced him, took his other mitten in her own. "I know you saved his life in the Room of Requirement. I know about him not turning you in. I'm so happy you survived the war, and my brother and his…" her smile turned wry. "And Hermione. But I just don't think I can give Malfoy a lot of credit for it. It was you. Your bravery and talent and luck and intelligence. You did it. And the help you got, it wasn't from him."

"Only, see, it was." He couldn't look her in the eye. "Forget the whole wand thing, that was insanely helpful but I know it wasn't on purpose. I mean at his house, Easter. He could have turned us in to Voldemort. His father was trying so hard to insist. But Malfoy didn't. I think saying yes would have been easier than no, but he didn't and … yeah. And I don't like seeing him bullied because, you know, that's just wrong. Even if he is Malfoy."

"Well, it doesn't really bother me, Harry, because… I could tell you stories about last year that would curl your hair. He spent the entire year trying to suck up to the Carrows."

"And that's bad, of course it is," he agreed, nodding, looking into her eyebrows. "But I think… I think, so is this." He forced his left leg to stop jiggling. "And I think what, what we… you and I, I mean, did to him the other night… I think that was really…" his voice wavered and he hated it. He made it sound stronger. "I think it was wrong, Ginny." He took a deep breath and let the air burn his throat. "I think it was wrong."

She smiled as she squeezed both of his hands. "I love how noble you are," she said. But the rest of their walk was in silence.

***** ***** *****

Confused, upset, uncertain, he allowed most of that week to pass without doing anything. But when he saw Malfoy lying in a dazed heap in a secluded corner near the library, books and parchment all over the floor, nose and lip leaking thick red blood, he stopped.

Ginny huffed at him, but he patted her hand and walked away from her, walked toward Malfoy. He knelt and began gathering Malfoy's things by hand, completely confused about what he might say.

Ginny stood there, tapping her foot intermittently, like she wanted to stop but kept forgetting.

"You can… please. Can you go on to the tower, now?" he managed to say to her over his shoulder. It shouldn't be so hard to ask her to do something perfectly reasonable, even if she didn't want to.

Ginny paused and they stared at each other. Then she nodded. "You should have him give you another one, Harry," she said. "S'all he's good for anyway." He didn't want to consider her tone of voice. They would be fine.

She walked away. Harry exhaled and turned back to Malfoy, still not speaking to the other boy.

Malfoy didn't seem to know what to say either, and soon they'd finished gathering and repairing Malfoy's damaged belongings.

Then there was nothing left to do. Harry wondered if he should have offered Malfoy a hand up, but by the time he thought of it, Malfoy was already standing.

It would have been too odd to hold that hand in his own anyway.

"Thank you. You didn't have to do that," Malfoy finally said. His voice was very soft, but Harry heard it. The hallway was oddly silent, other than the two of them. Harry looked up and saw that all the portraits were staring.

"Actually, Malfoy, I think… er. I think I did. Not sure why but… I think…. I did." Harry stood up straighter and looked on as Malfoy swung his bag over his shoulder. He thought Malfoy might have been trying to hide a wince as he did it.

"And I… I need to. Well." He kicked a rough edge in the flagstone floor. It was too close to the wall to have been worn perfectly smooth, despite incredible age. "I've been watching. I think you need, er…" he realized that offering protection would almost certainly be rejected. What eighteen year old bloke wanted to admit he needed protection? Especially from a former enemy. Damn. He hadn't given this anywhere near enough thought.

"I think you might need a…" What Malfoy obviously needed was a friend to watch his back, but how to say it? "A little help."

Malfoy snorted. "Are you volunteering then, Mr. Goody-Two-Shoes?"

Malfoy's lips curved into a sneer, and Harry's cock rushed and pulsed with blood. But he was straight, of course, and he would never cheat on his beautiful, perfect Ginny and besides, Malfoy would never do that again. It was degrading. Completely humiliating. The bloke obviously just needed a decent mate to help him out. Keep him company once or twice. Show the Slytherins Malfoy wasn't alone. Harry could be a, a mate, right? Just mates? Talk about Quidditch? Complain about Transfiguration?

"Yeah," he finally offered. "Yeah. I am. And the help I'm offering now is to walk you up to see Pomfrey. My healing charms are for shit."

Malfoy stared at him, then he smiled a strange, small smile. "Fine," he replied. "Earn it, if you like."

Harry ignored him and started walking toward the hospital wing. "Come along then, Malfoy. You've always been slower than me, haven't you?"

Pomfrey was fast and Malfoy was fine now. And Ginny had given permission and no one would come down this hall right now and Malfoy had offered. He'd offered.

This time Harry touched his hair for real.


	2. Holding On

Title: "Holding On." Part two of "Letting Go."  
Rating: NC-17  
Word Count: ~6100  
Summary: Harry isn't quite sure what to think, and definitely doesn't want to think about his feelings. Nonetheless, he might have found something to hold on to.  
Beta Acknowledgement: Beta by owensmom and oddnari.  
Disclaimer: They aren't mine, they belong to the clever Scottish lady. I just bend them and love them. Please don't smack me for playing. It isn't like I am going to earn any money from this!  
Author's Note: Almost a year ago I posted the first section of this fic. I am finally ready to post the second and final section.

I strenuously recommend that you reread "Letting Go" (ie, chapter one)  
before you read "Holding On."  
They are very much two halves of a whole.

Harry forced his eyes open. Weird how something so rewarding was so difficult. But it was worth it to watch those lips worship his cock.

Jesus.

Nothing else on earth felt like Draco fucking Malfoy drinking in Harry's prick. Hot, wet, that lavish tongue everywhere at once. Soft blond hair in Harry's fingers. Dazzling.

Draco grabbed Harry's rear in his hands and squeezed. Harry pulled out halfway, just to watch his cock slide out of Malfoy's mouth.

Harry had forced himself, at first, to do "friendly" things with Draco, like revise at the same library table or race around the Quidditch pitch. It was important for himself, as proof that it wasn't all about the blowjobs. And it was important to Draco's pride, proof that it wasn't all about Harry protecting Draco from bullies.

Harry rolled his hips forward, teasing the very back of Draco's mouth with the head of his cock. Draco didn't gag.

Luckily, unexpectedly, Draco was good company more often than not. Yes, he still sneered and postured and was shockingly clueless about some things, but Harry knew he had faults of his own. After all, Draco loved to point them out.

He also loved to suck Harry's cock. Harry couldn't understand it.

But Ginny had given permission, or, she had twice anyway, and surely a continuation was implied? And Draco kept offering. Harry used to turn him down two times out of three, out of guilt. But the more time they spent together, and the more times Harry allowed Draco to fall to his knees and eat him like candy, the more often Draco would offer. Eventually Harry was getting sucked off in an abandoned classroom, cobwebby broom closet or well-hidden alcove as often as six or seven times a week.

Harry thought about it as little as possible. What it meant. What might come next. He shoved it all in a closet in his head and locked the door.

Draco pulled off just enough to speak words into Harry's skin. "I want to come too. I'm going to wank while I suck you."

Draco was doing that more often.

Draco watched for Harry's nod. Draco would always word it as half-request, half-statement, then passively wait for permission.

Harry didn't want to watch Draco stroke his own dick of course, except the idea that sucking off Harry was that sexually arousing? That was worth experiencing fully. And Draco seemed to understand because, although the angle was awkward, he would twist to stroke himself under Harry's gaze.

Harry tried to figure out if Draco came faster while Harry was watching, but he never managed to look anywhere else. There was always next time, though.

* * *

Ginny was speaking softly, but her fists were clenched. Harry thought she might be wearing her nicest blouse, and makeup, like she'd planned something in advance and he'd missed it.

"I would simply like," she breathed, "to spend a bit more time with my boyfriend. I miss you."

"Ginny," he started, then stopped. He'd already explained that he was finally coming out of his shell a bit. That his demeanour, behaviour, were no longer so much of reactions to the war. That he wished she were glad that he was no longer nearly as stunned and withdrawn. He'd tried to convince her it was a good thing that he didn't moon around anymore, bored, miserable and envious while she practiced Quidditch with the team he was too old to rejoin. That she should be glad he no longer needed her to organize his every spare minute. He'd already reminded her that they still spent most evenings together, ate every meal together, and went to all the inter-house and Gryffindor common room parties together.

She'd not been convinced.

It was time for a different tactic. He took her clenched fists into his hands and tried to smooth them open so he could hold them. "I'm sorry you're unhappy, but I am comfortable with the way things are. I love the time we spend together. But I am not willing to give up the things I do away from you."

A tear filled one brown eye. She tried to hide it from him as she blinked it away. "I… I just don't understand. Why am I not enough for you anymore?"

Harry looked at the ceiling, crimson and gold. Some of the gold paint was peeling away in one corner. "I needed to spend a few months not making any decisions or being responsible for much of anything at all. I'm a lot better now. I'm more involved with school, interested in more than three people. I'd like you to be happy for me." He turned to look her in the face again, nervous about what he might see there. She looked… brave. Brave and pretty. She matched the room. He loved looking at her.

"I… will try to understand, Harry. I'll try to be glad. It's just…" she smiled wryly. "I'd quite become accustomed to having you all to myself."

They squeezed each other's hands and he pulled her into his arms. He petted her long red hair. They were going to be fine.

** ** **

It took ages to ask. Some confrontations require an inherently different sort of bravery.

They were on the floor of an old classroom now used only to store extra furniture, hiding behind three stacks of chairs. Draco had his head resting on Harry's thigh, one hand surreptitiously massaging his jaw. Their wet, deflated cocks hung out, ignored. They had both just come.

Harry's hand was still twisted through the longest part of Draco's hair. He hated to let go of it. They were both tired, anyway.

Harry looked at Draco. Eyes closed, body curled in a "c" under Harry's bridge of a left leg. He'd watched them both get off, Draco fucking his own wet fist and Harry unable to thrust into Draco's mouth while seated on the floor. It had taken longer as a result, and when he'd finally come, it had felt incredible. The trigger was when Draco had let go of his own cock with one hand and pulled - just exactly roughly enough - at Harry's scrotum.

"Why do you do this for me?" Harry murmured, not quite intentionally. He immediately wished he could take it back, but Draco just gazed at him sleepily.

"Because I enjoy it," he replied. The question didn't seem to surprise him at all. Though while he was this languid, perhaps nothing could.

"I don't understand," Harry confessed.

"Do you need to?" Draco asked, opening his eyes a bit more.

"I don't know," Harry answered, as honestly as he could. "I'll think about it." Then he blurted out the other question that had been dogging him. "Do you do this for anyone else?"

"Harry," Draco seemed pinkly surprised. "Are you jealous?"

"I…." This had never occurred to Harry. The implications were discomfiting.

"It's all right, you don't have to answer." Draco, still languid, seemed undisturbed. Had he been expecting this conversation?

Something else came to Harry's mind. This ought to shake Draco's aplomb. "You'd like it if I were jealous though, wouldn't you? Why?"

Draco seemed just as unruffled, however. And his answer only discomfited Harry further. "For the same reason that I enjoy sucking you, Harry. And no, I don't suck anyone else off. Only you." Draco put his head down again, and closed his eyes.

*** *** ***

"But Hermione," it was Ginny's voice. "Surely you want Ron to want only you, to get more serious."

They must think he was fast asleep. He nearly had been, too. He'd been hiding in a corner of the common room and had been so tired of studying that he had dragged a cloak over himself and let himself think about nothing for a long while. But that familiar voice, in that familiar tone, had pierced his stupor.

Not caring if this was dishonest, he slowly ducked his head a bit more securely under the cloak. He kept his posture slumped and his eyes closed, in case they checked on him.

Hermione's answer was indistinct, which meant she either wasn't sure what to say or was facing away from him and speaking softly. There was no way he was going to try to find out which.

"If you want Ron, or any boy, you have to be a little more of what he wants, you know?"

Harry heard an answer, but - while he could guess what Hermione would say about honesty and being true to one's self and such - he couldn't hear the actual response.

"I am certainly not suggesting dishonesty, Hermione!"

Heh. Did he know her, or what?

"I mean, of course I mean, absolutely you should be yourself! You just… choose carefully about which parts of yourself to be, is all. The rest will all fall into place once the boy commits."

Harry didn't care what Hermione had to say now. He tried to stop breathing and wished his damn heart would stop this heavy banging.

"You need to figure out what your guy wants in a girl, and see how you're already like that. Then you show him the parts of you that compliment his needs, his personality. Save the rest of you for your girlfriends or something. No relationship is ever going to satisfy every part of you, or so my mother tells me all the time, anyway."

Harry imagined Ginny's eyes were rolling. She so rarely mentioned Molly with respect.

"No, Hermione, I do not mean be someone else." She sighed. Harry thought Ginny might be patting Hermione's hand by now. Leaning forward and looking earnest and yet a bit incredulous, for sure.

"I am not a 'little kid,' dammit! I'm only a couple of years younger than you are! You're very smart, Hermione, but you don't always understand people, you know? It's obvious to anyone who looks at the two of you that you and Ron are made for each other. So play up the parts of you that he likes, like being spontaneous, and interested in him, obviously, and he likes it when you two cuddle, and he once mentioned to me how he loved seeing you tutoring the little kids, so you could do that more. All stuff that's already you, the real you, Hermione. You just… you make sure he sees it, is all."

There was muttering, and a pause. Then someone huffed. Harry would have laid good odds on it being Ginny.

"Of course, I consider myself an independent woman, Hermione! I want a career and marriage and children and I know Harry does too! And you and Ron and… doesn't everyone? And yes, I am speaking from experience. Harry wants me to be a certain way. What? Oh, I don't know. Demure, I guess. Innocent."

Harry nearly started under his warm cloak. What?

"It isn't like it's some sort of huge change or fake or anything for me, Merlin. It isn't like I did all sorts of stuff with other boys, you know! And I was raised… you know, sheltered."

Harry's breathing eased out some.

"So what if sometimes I think I'd like more than Harry wants to give? I'm fine with waiting until we get married. It's probably for the best. And yes, I put away some of my… racier clothes. They were getting too small anyway. My mother was thrilled with the clothes I asked her to buy. This is the real me, Hermione."

There was a short pause but Harry didn't hear Hermione respond.

"Besides, I'm sure Harry doesn't share every last drop of himself with me, either."

Harry stopped breathing altogether.

"He's all the time off with that ferret, which bothers me a lot, but whatever. I know, you and Ron don't like it either but what can we do? He obviously gets something out of … it … that he can't get from us. And that's fine, Hermione. I can't be his entire world and he can't be mine. So I just make sure that when we are together, our time is, you know, special. Smooth. That's all. And you can do the same thing with Ron. It will do wonders for your relationship."

Hermione made an uncertain noise.

"Like stop teaching him things, is what I mean, Hermione. And you could wear makeup occasionally. And, well, let's really think about this. C'mon, you can hang out in my room tonight. It'll be like a sleepover. Fun, right?"

Their voices faded as they walked up the girl's staircase and Harry opened his eyes. To see, not the inside of his warm winter cloak, but a perfect view of the room. He'd been under his invisibility cloak the whole time. No wonder the girls hadn't noticed him eavesdropping.

**** **** ****

Harry had promised to think about the whole - sucking off - thing, but this proved unnecessary. He could hardly stop thinking about it. Draco enjoyed sucking Harry's cock. He offered because he liked to do it. And he didn't do it for anyone else.

Harry tried to imagine sucking cock, tried to imagine how it could be pleasant, how it could feel sexual instead of disgusting, impossible, demeaning. He thought about trying to suck cock so often that it started to interfere with his nightly wank again. He would be imagining Draco's mouth and hands, remembering a recent blowjob with as much detail as he could recreate, when he'd start to imagine that - instead of his cock in Draco's mouth, Draco's cock was in front of him, aimed for his open, waiting lips. Then he'd be completely unable to come and have to start all over again.

It wasn't all bad, because on the nights when he fell asleep without coming, his next explosion in Draco's mouth was that much better for the wait.

But it certainly wasn't all good, either.

He tried tasting his own spunk. Disgusting. He tried to find a way to perceive the fantasy as sexually exciting. Impossible. He tried and tried to see opening up his mouth for another bloke's stuff and giving Draco pleasure as anything other than demeaning, but old perceptions kept coming back to colour his feelings.

He didn't feel like he was demeaning Draco when they fooled around, so why could he not think of returning the favour in a positive way? Let alone sexy.

It was hopeless. Especially because he simply could not let it go.

In retrospect, though, that he thought about it every night while he was wanking probably should have clued him in to something.

***** ***** *****

"Merlin, those jarveys Hagrid keeps! I hope Ginny doesn't hear some of that truly foul language when she has Care of Magical Creatures tomorrow."

"Don't worry about it, Harry. She probably wouldn't even recognize the words. We made sure she didn't learn any bad language at home. We always kept her in the dark about that sort of stuff."

They both heard Dean's snort.

They turned together, crossing their arms and giving their bunkmate their best "we're the team that snuffed the red-eyed monster" look, but Dean had apparently known them too long. Or being taller than even Ron meant something to his sense of safety. He showed no sign of being intimidated.

"Come off it, you two. She's playing you, Harry. She's not Rapunzel locked in a tower, no matter what her older brothers think." He leaned in slightly and lowered his voice. "I dated her for months, you know."

Harry forced an unnatural steadiness into his voice. "What are you saying, Dean? You're saying you fucked my girl?"

Dean's eyes saucered and his hands went up. "No! No, Harry. I just mean it wasn't all dry pecks on the cheek and holding hands in the Quidditch stands. She's a normal, healthy teenage girl. She's a nice girl, but she's… she's a lot more like everyone else than she's leading you to believe."

Dean took in Harry's narrowed eyes and Ron's clenched fists. "S'like a brick wall," he mumbled, though perfectly audibly. Then he ambled off, his long strides briefly flaring an envy in Harry's chest. Then Ron was angrily defending his little sister and Harry tried to make the appropriate noises of affirmation at the appropriate times, but he wasn't really listening. Dean's points about Ginny wouldn't leave him.

As it turned out, the only thing that could distract him was meeting Draco in the library after dinner.

****** ****** ******

"Draco?"

They were walking back from the Quidditch pitch. They'd had to wait till the Ravenclaw team was done practicing, and then they'd lost track of time. It had to be well after curfew by now, and extremely cold.

"Yeah?" Draco huffed. He didn't usually walk this quickly. They got to the shed and Harry opened the door. They leaned their brooms against the windowsill and together managed to put away the school snitch without releasing a Bludger.

"Well, what is it, Harry?" he sounded impatient and Harry decided it was far too late at night for a conversation like this.

"Can I try to suck your cock?"

Some part of Harry's brain had apparently vetoed that plan.

"Er… hell, yes?"

"I can't promise it'll be good!" Harry felt compelled to mention. "You know I've never…."

Draco was already casting warming charms, taking off his clothes. Harry stopped talking and swallowed at the lump that had appeared in his throat. It didn't work.

"I know. But even if you accidentally bite me a little, it's going to be good, Harry."

"How can you know that?" Harry whispered.

Draco smiled, and Harry decided that even though it should have looked predatory and frightening, instead the smile looked only anticipatory.

"Because it's you."

******* ******* *******

Sucking cock turned out to be the most extraordinarily ordinary thing in the world. Parts actually were, to Harry's abiding shock, sexually arousing. Draco made great noises, and the gratitude and reciprocation were more than worth the parts that took real work and thought. It was true that even once he got over his nervousness he was always worrying about doing it right. Was this motion too repetitive? Was that a good rhythm? Shouldn't he be more creative? And when was he supposed to breathe?

But mostly it felt like he had a penis in his mouth. Strange, and unexpected at first, but… just part of someone he'd come to care for more than he'd ever imagined possible. So. A penis was in his mouth. Which would only be "disgusting" if you didn't want a penis - that penis - in your mouth. And to his surprise, Harry did. Some of the time.

Harry realized the next day, while sucking Draco off for the third time, determined to make it all the way to the swallow this time, dammit, that eating a girl out was probably pretty similar. At points his breath would be stuttery and broken from arousal, and at other points it would be a little hard to breathe because he'd be working hard to give his lover pleasure but there would be damp flesh in the way.

Around then, he realized he was cheating on Ginny.

After Draco came (in his hand again, but he'd get it one of these days, he was determined), Harry kissed Draco's temple and said he had to go earlier than he'd planned.

"Anything I should know about?" Draco asked, sounding casual, eyes at Harry's hairline, fingers bunching fabric.

"I'm not sure yet," Harry finally told the doorframe as he walked out. Truth and lies both seemed as impossible as eye contact. He hurried to the tower, hoping that Ginny would be there alone, and hoping at least as fervently that she'd been called home for a week for no reason.

******** ******** ********

"Here's the thing, Ginny," Harry told the wall behind her hair.

Ginny had been easy to find, eager to get them alone.

"I think the way you feel about… sexual stuff…."

She seemed to regret rushing into an empty dorm room with him now, however. Her arms were crossed high on her chest and her foot tapped. Her eyes were shiny, like they might be wet.

Harry sat down on some fourth year's bed and spoke to his shoes in between nervous glances at Ginny. He'd tried to plan this in advance, but it was nonetheless coming out in a messy, half-planned rush of confessional misery.

"You wanted him to suck me off because…."

Her eyes were very wide and she was breathing funny. Her arms weren't crossed anymore so much as wrapped around her middle, like vines. But she said nothing.

"Because you thought it was a way to punish him. Sex isn't punishment, Ginny. Sex is, umm, sex is great." He looked at her nervously for a moment, then kept going. If he didn't manage this now… "Blowjobs are something nice you do for someone you care about. They're… giving them is… it's sexy."

"How the hell would you know?" She snapped. And then her eyes overtook her forehead and her hands flew to her mouth.

"Yeah. I let him do it, like you told me to, and then, eventually, I saw how much he liked it, and how much he liked me, and I wanted, or maybe needed, to try it. It isn't disgusting, and I… it really bothers me that… it's great, Ginny. It's great because he's great. And he thinks I'm great. And that's why he wants to do it and why I want to."

"It's disgusting, Harry. Every time I try to imagine… I love you! And I would never! And… it isn't like I would ask you to do anything like that for me, you know! We're equal! We were supposed to be equal partners and never ask anything unpleasant or difficult of the other person! Our life was supposed to be easy and perfect and wonderful, Harry," she sat on a bed and started to cry.

"Love makes life easy, doesn't it? And perfect? Happily ever after. I thought… what the hell are you saying to me, Harry? Are we… are you breaking up with me? Did you really cheat on me with a… Death…."

Harry moved to Ginny's bed and put a hand on her back, feeling like a troll comforting an elven princess. His hand looked huge and lumpen on her shoulder and he switched his gaze to the books, parchment scraps and socks strewn on the floor.

"Love doesn't make life easy and perfect, Ginny. My mum and dad loved each other like some fairy tale, or so I'm told, and look what happened to them. Also Draco was never a Death Eater. He isn't marked and yes I checked."

He paused and patted at her shoulder. She wriggled a little and he couldn't tell if that meant "that's all right" or "will you fucking stop touching me already?" He left his hand where it was and felt even more Trollish. So he patted her once more and took his hand away. She sniffed really loudly.

"Ginny, if things had… worked out differently, and we'd gotten married," she sniffed again and grabbed her wand. He winced but she merely transfigured a crumpled scrap of parchment up from the floor into a large white handkerchief and blew her nose. He waited till she was quieter.

"Marriage isn't like what you're talking about, Ginny. Think about your mum and dad."

He wasn't done, but she cut in viciously. "I will never be anything even remotely like my mum, dammit! I am not going to be some… housewife! I am my own person!"

Her vehemence surprised him, but he tried to roll with it. "Okay, so what about your mother's life do you not want to repeat? I thought you wanted kids?"

"I do!" She patted at her nose with the new hanky once and turned to look at him. Their faces were suddenly too close and he tried to be smooth about moving away a bit. She didn't seem to notice, maybe he'd succeeded. Or maybe she was really distracted.

"I want a lot of kids, Harry! But I want a career, too!"

"That's fair," he answered easily. He'd known that part already. "I want a career, too. But who was going to, you know, raise them?"

"We were, of course, what do you mean?"

"Well, who was going to change the nappies and cook the food and teach them to… blow their noses and all that messy, disgusting stuff that's all part of living with people in a house?" Harry had a sudden, vivid memory of cleaning the oven while his Aunt Petunia scrubbed the refrigerator. She didn't like him to do that, because he ate more than she thought he was entitled to the only time she'd let him.

Ginny just stared at him. Her mouth opened, then she closed it again without speaking.

"If we got married, Ginny, and had kids, there would be messes. And, you know, work. Magic doesn't do it all. That's why your mum is busy all the time. Someone has to do the cooking and the cleaning and the knitting and the… you know, the work. Do you think she does that stuff because it's fun? Because I used to do that stuff all the time for my aunt and uncle, and it isn't fun. But it has to be done anyway. Your mum does that stuff because she loves all of you and she wants you to have good food and a clean house and all that… you know, stuff you want. For the people you love."

"Harry, what the bloody hell does this have to do with you leaving me for a Dea… for Draco freaking Malfoy?"

"This." He took a breath and patted her back one more time, then dropped his hands to his lap. She wiped her nose again while he tried to form his thoughts.

"It's this, Ginny. You have this fantasy about us, and our future, and it's gorgeous. I loved that story. I told myself that story every night while I was on the run last year. And when I got back and you were still waiting and we could pretend for a while that we were going to live it someday, it was beautiful. I needed to hide from reality for a while, and I loved hiding in that future.

"But that future can't come true, because it's not what real life is like. Or real love, or real marriage. It isn't that I don't love you, that I didn't want to marry you—."

She sobbed again and he waited for her to quieten.

"-- but no marriage looks like what you and I were pretending. And Draco… he understands real life a little better than… well, than you do. He knows you have to take the messy with the good, the work with the play. And he's willing to do things to make me happy, because he understands that the world works like that."

"So… you're telling me… you're leaving me for Draco Malfoy, because he's more grown up than I am? Was there no one else in the whole bloody school that fit that description?" Her eyes were red and wet and the hanky was in a white ball under her nose. Red hairs stuck to her temple and cheek and he resisted the impulse to tuck them behind her ear. That wasn't for him to do. Not anymore.

"There was no one else in the school that my girlfriend was encouraging me to have sex with instead of her," he said as softly and gently as he could manage, and she started to cry in earnest.

********* ********* *********

"Here's the thing, Draco." He clasped Draco's hands in his own and willed his desperate sincerity to somehow come through his eyes and convince Draco where his words would surely fail.

"This is what I've come to understand that I think you already knew. I mean, I think you taught me this. You go down on your lover not because every moment of it is unmitigated bliss for you, but because you are mad about him and want him to feel good."

Harry squeezed Draco's hands, willing them to feel less limp in his. He looked at the ceiling for a moment, striving to collect his swirling thoughts.

"A good blowjob might make your jaw ache a bit, but you do it anyway, because giving me pleasure is a joy and sexy and because I'm going to return the favour. That's equality. Not never having to do anything unpleasant."

Draco might have been looking into Harry's eyes, but Harry thought he was probably looking just above them, instead. Harry rushed on.

"Relationships take work. No matter how strong your love or your physical attraction, parts of it are hard work. Love means getting on that broom and doing the stuff that needs doing. Love means putting your beloved first a good part of the time. Love means kindness, listening, respect. It doesn't mean fairytale endings, sunsets and magic. Magic is from wands.

"I think Ginny's been reading too many romance novels and disparaging her own lucky roots. I was telling myself her lovely, tempting lies and now I can't anymore. So now I want to be with you."

Draco looked Harry in the eye for a long heartbeat. (He really had been looking elsewhere before. Damn.) His face was wan, and Harry felt his own face go hot, then cold in the quiet. Their hands stayed between them, all four holding on, waiting for answers.

"We should sit now," Draco finally said, in a very soft and careful voice.

Harry sat slowly and carefully, so the porcelain teacup of his equilibrium wouldn't crack open and spill over the rug. He didn't let go of Draco's hands.

"I can't… I mean…." Draco closed his eyes and took a deep breath. Harry just stared. He'd given it all up. Now what? What was Draco going to say? Was leaving Ginny going to be the greatest regret of his life? Had he gone too fast, assumed too much about what she was, who he was, and Draco… Fuck, would Ginny take him back? Not if she'd already told Ron, or Dean….

"I am so flattered by everything you've apparently learned from me. I can't believe how much you've come to understand in such a short time. And no, you didn't really learn all of that from me, I… I didn't really see it all like that, you just explained most of it to me, I…

"But that isn't the important part. The really important part is… Merlin, I can't believe I didn't say this already…."

Harry felt his heart expand and contract in his chest and his vision got a little dark around the edges. Draco's hands were squeezing his so hard now. That was probably an improvement, though.

"Of course I want to be with you. Of course I want to be your boyfriend. For as long as you'll have me, fuck. I've wanted nothing else for so long, longer than I can say." He bent his head toward the floor for a moment and Harry heard him sigh before he looked into Harry's frightened eyes again. "Which is why there's something I really ought to tell you."

Harry couldn't make a sound.

"I've never lied to you, Harry. Not once. Never. But… I did… I…."

"I need to know, Draco." It sounded croaky, but Harry figured that had to be good enough.

"I've been… manipulating this situation. A lot more in the beginning. Well, no. Only in the beginning, really. But all that bullying you saw me suffering from? I told them to do that. Pansy's one of my best friends. She'd never pour juice in my bag unless I … er… asked her to. And I did. Some of them got a lot more into it than I expected, but I reacted stupidly, helplessly, only when I thought you would see. I wanted you to feel sorry for me. I wanted you to notice me."

Harry's hands went limp and now Draco was the one holding on for dear life.

"The… game… that first…."

"Yeah. I asked Zabini to dare me to suck your cock. I never thought your girlfriend would be the one to make it happen, though! I figured you two would bow to peer pressure, or she'd say no and it would be a conflict for you two, or it wouldn't happen at all, but you'd be stuck imagining it. When she turned out to be the one who was encouraging you, I got really confused."

"She thinks they're degrading."

Draco's eyes sharpened momentarily. "Yeah…. She hissed something like that at me in a corridor once. I think she said 'you belong on your knees, cocksucker.'"

"That…" Harry swallowed. "That does sound like her, really."

Overwhelmed, Harry sat silently and let Draco squeeze his hands. He stared down at them. Draco's were larger than his, and paler. Scenes from the last several weeks whirled through his mind faster than he could easily process them. An image returned to him repeatedly enough to bring clarity, and he swallowed.

"How did you know about…." Harry couldn't finish the sentence and his face was boiling.

"About?" Draco finally asked.

"My, the… the way you pull on my…."

"Oh." Draco turned pink. "The way I pull on your, er, ball-sac?"

Harry nodded, staring at Draco's knees.

"Well, I… just do what I like on me. I have a cock too, and… yeah." He lost volume, but continued. "I wank a lot. I'm usually thinking about you when I wank, you know."

He looked up suddenly. Harry tried to look him in the eye and almost managed it, except that his face was going to melt off into his robes any second now. Draco took a deep breath and Harry looked at the wall.

"And I tried that in fifth year and… yeah. It was great. I thought you might agree."

"So that wasn't some kind of… magic or manipulation or… Legilimency or…?"

"No. That was just… lust." Harry could hardly hear him.

"You know," Draco suddenly blurted, "Pansy thinks I wanted her to… er… help me… with the bullying and the juice, you know, help me to…"

"Manipulate me?" Harry said miserably.

Draco didn't respond. "She thinks I want your sympathy, because there might be a trial after school ends, or something. But you have to know, Harry, that isn't it. If she says that to you, it isn't true. I just… I just wanted you. I want you."

"So what you are saying is," Harry tried to pull his hands away from Draco's, but Draco held on and Harry decided not to fight him. "You're telling me you messed with my head, but it's okay because you did it to get into my pants?"

Draco's sad smile was crooked and he tipped his head to the side. "When you put it that way, it sounds awful."

Harry forced himself to breathe quietly. He felt truly taken aback, but he was still working to stay in control. Draco had never actually lied to him. And now Harry really had to decide. Ginny was too immature, but Draco was a little too Slytherin. On the other hand, he did tell Harry the truth. So, now what? The childish girl, or the sneaky boy? The manipulator, or the manipulator? Or maybe just… no one? He raised his eyes and looked at a stranger he had thought he knew so well only half an hour ago. His fingers itched with a need to touch Draco's hair and he sighed. He thought about all the things he'd told Ginny. Maybe Ginny wasn't the only one who still needed to grow up.

"I wanted you, too," Harry said, and leaned over to kiss Draco's temple. But Draco moved and Harry's lips touched lips. As he lost himself in the desire he'd learned he couldn't really control, Harry decided to roll with it. He was only eighteen and a half, which seemed adult to him but all the 'real' adults kept declaring him a child. Why not just… enjoy it for a few more months? The future would be what they made of it and a kiss - or a blowjob for that matter - wasn't a declaration of marriage.

He pushed one hand into Draco's hair and held on.

Finis


End file.
